Flu Shot Tied to Healthy Pregnancy

Flu Shot Tied to Healthy Pregnancy

Pregnant
women who received the flu vaccine during the 2009 flu pandemic lowered
their risk of delivering premature babies, a new study found.

Typically
flu vaccination rates among pregnant women have hovered between 13 to
18 percent nationally. But a push by health officials during the 2009
season drove vaccination rates for the H1N1 vaccine up to about 45
percent in the United States, where they have remained since.

Some
expectant mothers have been reluctant to get a flu shot over concern
about the health of the fetus, but the study showed that flu vaccination
was not only safe but protective, said Dr. Saad Omer of the Rollins
School of Public Health at Emory University, the senior author of the
study.

Dr. Omer and his colleagues looked at the electronic
medical records of 3,327 pregnant women between April 2009 and April
2010. The study, published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases,
found that the infants born to vaccinated mothers had a 37 percent
lower likelihood of being premature, and they also weighed more at birth
than babies born to unvaccinated women.

“Our thinking is that by
preventing flu infection, we are reducing the likelihood of inflammation
in pregnant women and therefore having a protective effect against
preterm birth,” Dr. Omer said.